The present invention relates to the field of optical storage or disc players, and in particular to a floating frame for optical disc loader to reduce the vibration experienced by an optical disc when rotating at high speeds.
In the optical disc drive industry, there is an ever-increasing competition to increase the rate at which the data can be transferred from a disc to a peripheral device. In order to achieve the higher speeds, the drive must be able to spin the disc at correspondingly increased rotational speeds. So for instance, a 4xc3x97CD-ROM drive should be able to spin the CD-ROM disc about twice as fast as that of a 2xc3x97drive. With increased rotational speeds, however, the disc experiences increased vibration. This vibration, which increases exponentially with speed, is a serious problem which can significantly hinder the drive""s performance. Intermittent data streaming, for example, is one such a problem where the drive is unable to read some of the data off the CD-ROM. This problem may make video applications inoperable, or may unduly slow down other applications due to extended error recovery time.
The main causes for the drive vibration are the high linear acceleration of the optical pickup unit and the eccentricity of the system. There are two sources for the eccentricity: the spindle turntable and the optical disc. The disc eccentricity is the major contributor to the drive""s vibration and this problem becomes even more significant as drive speed increases.
To alleviate the vibration, virtually all of the current drives come with floating sub-chassis which supports the traverse mechanism. To achieve this, the floaters are placed at the key joints that join the sub-chassis to the main chassis. The floaters are typically made of flexible rubber or other similar material. By floating the sub-chassis some of the vibrations are absorbed by the floaters, thus dampening the overall vibrational effect on the traverse mechanism. Although this method has been relatively successful in reducing the vibration for the currently existing optical disc drives, as the disc are rotated at higher speeds, such as in the 12xc3x97drives, there is a greater need for a better dampen the vibration. In light of the continual evolution in the optical disc drives, there is clearly a need for an optical disc loading mechanism with better vibrational dampening mechanism.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a frame for an optical disc loader with improved vibration dampening features so that the optical disc may be rotated at higher speeds without experiencing substantial degradation in performance.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a frame for an optical disc loader with improved vibration dampening features which are easy to manufacture and implement into the loader.
The present invention is a floating frame for an optical disc loader. It includes a pivoting-type sub-chassis of 1-degree of freedom of movement. It is rigidly connected to a chassis without any floaters. Floaters are placed at the four comers of the chassis to support the entire loader. The floater has a wide mid-section and a narrow tip. Above the mid-section are upper slots, and below the mid-section are lower slots. The floater should preferably be made of flexible material such as rubber.